(Atlantic, Iowa) – The Atlantic School Board, during their meeting Wednesday, heard a report from I-CAT (Iowa Construction Advocate Team) member Chad Alley, with regard to an assessment of the district’s facilities, which Alley said are in remarkably good condition, which he attributed to ACSD Maintenance Director Russell Peck and his staff.

Alley said the inspection normally takes two full days, but because the district’s buildings were in such good shape, it only took a day and a morning to complete the assessment, which showed in-part, he said, that the Atlantic Middle School is “absolutely beautiful.”

The school sustained heavy interior smoke and water damage during a fire that began on the roof of the building July, 27, 2021. One-year later, the damage had been repaired and renovations completed in-time for students who were relocated to other district buildings, could go back in their regular classrooms. Chad Alley said the next step for the school board is to talk with some architects for long-term (10-to 15-years) needs and establish a 10-year maintenance plan. That includes a replacement roof for the High School.

The plan would include “Urgent” repairs, replacement or upgrades (those that need to take place in one-to two-years maximum), “Required” (2-to 5-years), “Recommended” (5-to 10-years), and “Suggested” (10-to 15-years out). He said are some Urgent items, a few required, and more of those that are Recommended, in the Maintenance Plan.
The biggest costs would be associated with the High School.

He said Washington Elementary “Is a great old building. It has great bones.” The Early Childhood Center (building) is “Not bad” Alley said. The district’s buildings are currently being inspected and prepared for upgraded safety and security. Some of the suggested improvements in a few of the buildings include additional lighting and ventilation, fire suppression, tuck-pointing and so one.

Alley stressed safety and security should be the highest priority right now, to include parking bollards to prevent vehicle entry into buildings, accidentally or otherwise. He pointed to an incident that occurred in Creston as a reason for the barriers.

He said creating a master plan and talking with an architect are the next big steps. The Iowa Association of School Boards I-Cat program does not cost a penny until a construction project begins. An architect will cost about $30-to $40-thousand dollars, “But it’ll be the best use for a long-term 15-year plan that you can probably come up with.”

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Supreme Court has unanimously ruled the Linn County Auditor can pursue his lawsuit that questions the security of Iowa’s voter registration system. In 2019, Linn County Auditor Joel Miller, a Democrat, alleged the state’s computerized database of registered voters is potentially vulnerable to cyber threats. Last year a district court dismissed Miller’s lawsuit on the matter, but the Iowa Supreme Court says Miller has the right to go to court and get answers about the security of Iowa voter registration lists.

Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate, a Republican, says first and foremost, he wants to assure Iowa voters that Iowa’s election systems are secure. Pate says in the years since Miller’s complaint was filed in 2019, the state has installed robust cybersecurity measures in its election systems.

You may recall Linn County Auditor Joel Miller was the Democrat who ran against Secretary of State Paul Pate in 2022 and Miller questioned how Pate had spent eight million dollars to update Iowa’s computerized voter registration system. Pate, a Republican who also lives and voted in Linn County, won that race with about 60 percent of the vote.

(Radio Iowa)  -Social media pages are lit up by photos Iowans took of the Northern Lights last night and stargazers are hoping for a repeat tonight. There are few certain things in life, and catching the aurora borealis over Iowa is definitely -not- one of them. University of Iowa Physics & Astronomy Professor Allison Jaynes watched the dancing bands of green and red over a cornfield near Iowa City last night and says it’s a roll of the dice whether we’ll see the rare treat again after the sun sets in a few hours.

The lights were visible Thursday night over the Johnston area. (National Weather Service photo)

“The solar wind speed is still very high and that’s very good news for us. That means that there’s still energy coming into Earth’s magnetic field from the sun, and it just is a matter of if that persists or if it doesn’t,” Jaynes says. “So we’re going to have to wait and see.”

Seeing the spectacle in the sky is often a simple matter of being in the right place at the right time.

Prof. Allison Jaynes (UI photo)

“We can’t predict when the Aurora is going to show up and where it’s going to be. In general, the best place to look will be north,” she says. “So if you can get away from any area where there’s a city to your north and then have a look at the northern horizon, that’s the best bet for us down here in the mid-latitudes.”

If you’re going to drive an hour to get out of town on the hopes of trying to see the light show, it’s hard to know exactly when to launch the adventure. Jaynes says you would be wise to use the internet before hopping in the car with a blanket and binoculars.

“There’s several great Aurora watchers that are out there. There’s the Aurora Guy, Vincent Ledvina, one of my colleagues up in Alaska,” Jaynes says. “And there’s Aurorasaurus, which is a crowdsourcing platform which looks at tweets that mention aurora and then tries to show a distribution of where people are seeing aurora across the world.”

While the photos are often colorful and mesmerizing, keep in mind, those were likely obtained by someone using a long exposure and a tripod. Catching the real thing can be a thrill — or it can be a little disappointing — depending on your expectations.

“The pictures you see online are from people’s cameras, and that’s normally not what they’re seeing with their eyes,” Jaynes says. “The cameras are much more sensitive than our eyes, so it’s very important if you want to see it firsthand with your own eyes, to go to a very dark spot. And that being said, there is not that much of that here in Iowa or anywhere in most of where people live in this country.”

While Iowa is considered a rural, agricultural state, it’s full of light — and light pollution — at night, especially when you look at something like the Dark Sky Map. Still, Jaynes says she’s encouraged how the recent aurora appearances have captured the attention of so many people, who venture forth and gaze into the heavens.

“I saw lots of people out last night. Actually, I was driving along rural roads just trying to find a spot where you could see north over the cornfields — and there were cars everywhere,” she says. “People stopped, people outside with cameras, so it’s really a community event right now, and people are taking notice.”

Fingers crossed for tonight!

(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Supreme Court has upheld the sentence of a Fairfield teen who pleaded guilty to murdering his Spanish teacher. Willard Miller, who was 16 at the time of the crime, was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after serving 35 years. Miller’s attorney argued there should be expert testimony about sentencing a juvenile to a mandatory minimum sentence, and Miller’s attorney called the sentence unconstitutional.

The justices’ opinion says the Iowa Constitution does not ban giving minimum sentences to juveniles and it says there’s no state law requiring expert testimony. Miller and another student pleaded guilty to murdering Fairfield Spanish teacher Nohema Graber (noh-AY-muh GRAY-ber) three years ago.

The Iowa Supreme Court’s chief justice, who wrote the unanimous opinion, said: “the harm to Graber and her family is no less because Miller committed the crime as a juvenile.”